What is reasonable (texture loading)

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Okay, I know this has been talked about a lot, but I would like to know (to end my never ending tweaking) what is reasonable and what is not when it comes to loading ground textures, because I sort of forgot what too expect...As it is now, with everything set up the best I could, flying at about 2000 - 3000 ft, the highest res groundtextures load when the plane has almost reached that spot. So when I am flying straightforward in the SF260 and I look outside to the left at 45 degrees, I can see the high res textures load just before the 'reach' the wing of the FS260. So in effect when I look outside the realism is spoiled because I constantly see textures being loaded (I won't even begin about the autogen popup...). I would really love to see those textures load earlier. They DO load and I don't have constant blurries, but I don't really know (anymore) what to expect and what is reasonable! Do your textures load earlier? Before you reach them? Do you clearly see them pop into sharper images or does that happen before you reach that point?The irritating thing is, that when I look BACK outside of the window, all is very fine!!! I wish it was possible to move the center of the LOD to a spot in FRONT of the aircraft!Once again, I do NOT ask this to start another blurry-topic and I do not need answers on how to setup my computer and that I probably have my sliders too high (because this is the case with high settings and with very low settings)! I just would like to know what is reasonable! If I should settle for what I've got or not...

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Guest fundies

I was noticing this texture loading as well with the LOD radius set to medium. I returned it to high, and now the textures seem to load in quicker for me. I still find that at altitude above 3000ft, that flying with autogen off looks by far the best, with crisp, clear ground textures as opposed to the slightly muddy ground textures with autogen on.

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Same in my experience-high LOD works the best for me-though I have a machine that has no problem with high settings and I don't see blurries.I have made a compromise on the autogen which I used to run off. Now I run with full trees (full autogen to the right) but with the buildings completely off (fsx config setting buildings to 0). Leaving scenery complexity maxed which gives city buildings, and airport buildings I get the best of both worlds-nice trees and buildings at the ground level, nice forests in rural areas, and sharp clear more realistic (imho) generic building looks from altitude as the photo textures show thru.http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/1b5baf...b9f427f694g.jpgMy blog:http://geofageofa.spaces.live.com/

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Yes, I also tried that (no houses) and it's quite nice, really!Anyway, I have LOD at max but still see textures getting loaded nearby... even with all autogen off and very low settings! My machine has also no problem with high settings, because I get very nice fps even with autogen at extremely dense. But I can clearly see slightly blurred textures being replaced by the hi-res textures, specially when I use the only-trees-autogen trick! It's not completely blurred, but those 'slightly blurred textures' are the ones that get loaded BEFORE the final hi-res one get loaded. Everytime I look at the window something gets loaded and it completely spoils it for me...I keep having the feeling something is not right... :s But I've installed everything from scratch again, setup nHancer the right way and even let O&O defrag multiple times!!!

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I have no idea what is reasonable - all I know is what I get. Here is the view while flying, looking towards the rear of the aircraft (the great Munch Brothers Rotorway, thanks guys!):http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/183057.jpgIt looks better without the JPEG compression. Just astonishing to me - consider that I have a 5-year old Athlon 3000+ XP, 512 MB RAM, and an old FX5200! It is incredible that the game even runs.By the way, that is the rotor blur above the helo, not ground blurries.I have the same as you when looking towards the front:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/183059.jpgI have the suspicion that things were better before installing SP2 - did the developers diminish the distance for display of highest MIPs? No idea. And I won't un-install just to find out.Still, for the kind of flying that I do, island hopping, very low and slow, this is pretty close to heaven! My sympathies however to those that fly fast, complex aircraft - I can understand their gripes.Best regards.Luis

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Guest jshyluk

Moving the center of the LOD around is an intersting idea. I recall getting into a conversation about how the LOD radius works, and although the mechanics of it promptly went past my pay grade, the basic idea stands: the LOD is fixed by the user settings, yet things could improve if it were dynamic within a flight. That is, if not only the center of the LOD circle would shift depending on the speed of the aircraft, but also perhaps even the shape of the LOD: something conical or speheroid, or something that morphs around those shapes. I'm pretty sure there's no way to jigger around with this in FSX without some heavy-duty programming, so it looks like something for the wishlist for the next MSFS. Jeff ShylukAssistant Managing EditorSenior Staff ReviewerAVSIM

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Yes, I also don't think a simple change in a cfg will do the trick here. ;) Who knows in FS11...! I'm sure moving the centre of the LOD will give some problems, like what happens when you quickly turn around, but there are a lot of possibilites to enhance the LOD-system.I still don't know if what I am seeing is a problem or not. Well, to me it is. ;) Maybe I just expect too much, but I can't imagine anyone being happy with looking outside the window and seeing textures being loaded. But as said, I already did a complete re-install of FSX (the most extensive one I ever did, with hours and hours of defragging) and it didn't help at all, so I am at the end of the line here... I really don't want to install Vista all over again, that's for sure. And even if I did, that could mean that over time FSX performs less and less which would mean I'd gave to install everything every half year or so... (Well, I DO want to re-install Vista, but I've got so much programs installed (specially for making music) that the idea of having to do that all over again make me sick...! And I really doubt it would help, which would make things even worse...)

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This problem only appears when flying very close to the ground. Otherwise, at just a few thousand feet, the highest resolution MIP will never load:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/183133.jpgIf you find the texture loading extremely objectionable, then turning the Ground Texture slider to 2 meters will prevent the 1 meter texture from ever loading. Of course, you will not see the highest resolution by doing that. Just flying a little higher will also give the same results.I was curious and decided to see how the same looked in FS 9 - here are some shots looking towards the rear of the aircraft, towards the front, and directly under:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/183134.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/183135.jpghttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/183136.jpgThose are the highest resolution ground textures in FS 9. I would never go back to that after FS X, and that is probably one of the reasons why so many of us are willing to put up with all the problems.Best regards.Luis

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Luis I really dig the polka-dots on that helicopter. :)@J van EAgreed, if I saw texture loading I too would not like it at all. It could be happening to me, but I just don't notice it, if it is. I am running LOD slider at High if that means anything. I won't even consider running it any lower. I would rather compromise on other sliders, than move LOD down any. That's how important a nice wide LOD is to me.RhettAMD 3700+ (@2585 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2gb Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8 (1T), WD 150 gig 10000rpm Raptor, WD 250gig 7200rpm SATA2, Seagate 120gb 5400 rpm external HD, CoolerMaster Praetorian

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Guest firehawk44

"yet things could improve if it [LOD setting] were dynamic within a flight. That is, if not only the center of the LOD circle would shift depending on the speed of the aircraft, but also perhaps even the shape of the LOD: something conical or speheroid, or something that morphs around those shapes."Wow Jeff, that's quite a statement! Do you think that's going to really be possible in your great- great-grandchildren's lifetime? LOL. Well, maybe but probably in a more sophisticated method should a flight sim still exist then. I doubt we'll see much improvement in a future version of FS unless hardware is dramatically changed. And I think most will enjoy FSX more if they upgraded their computer systems to the latest computer technology. Right now I receive excellent FPS and scenery detail with my Dell XPS 720H2C w/30" monitor. I can do much better though as this system is almost 8 months old now and better stuff is out there already but I'll wait a few more months. I think my next upgrade will be from Vista 32 bit to Vista 64 bit but I'm waiting and keeping my ears to the ground as they could suddenly come up with a Vista 128 bit version.... It always happens whenever I upgrade. Having fun anyway in Northern Virginia!Best regards,Jim Young

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Hey Geofa-I hearby nominate you for and award for your zero buildings/trees suggestion. The jerkyness during turns coming off of KLAX runway 7L heading north to SFO are completely gone. I have a high-end machine too :-) Excellent tweak.Thanks,Mark

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I don't think there is anything wrong with your system, based on your description, but as others have said, you may want to decide if 1m textures (great detail at very low altitude) or 2m texture resolution (not so much texture sharpening close by) is what you like better :-)When I just take off and rapidly climb to altitude, 2m textures work great... but when I want to fly really low and slow, I cannot do without the 1m detail..Depending on what flying you plan to do that day, you may want to pick one or the other ;-)

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